Atlantis astronauts looking forward to half-day offBY WILLIAM HARWOODSTORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS "SPACE PLACE" & USED WITH PERMISSIONPosted: July 14, 2011

The Atlantis astronauts, looking forward to a half day off after a busy week in space, pressed ahead Thursday with work to unload a cargo module packed with supplies and equipment for the International Space Station. The lab's Russian crew members planned to carry out a bit of mechanical surgery on a high-tech treadmill, installing a new gyroscope needed by its vibration isolation system.

Credit: NASA

The shuttle crew was awakened around 1:30 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) by R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe singing "Man on the Moon."

"Good morning, Atlantis, this is Michael Stipe from R.E.M.," the singer said in a message recorded before launch in Venice, Italy. "We wish you much success on your mission, and thank all the women and men at NASA who have worked on shuttle for three decades. From Earth, a very good morning to you."

"Good morning, Houston, and all we can say up here is wow," said Atlantis pilot Douglas Hurley. "We'd like to thank Mr. Michael Stipe for sending up that wonderful message and that great song. I know a lot of us up have been listening to R.E.M. for a long, long time and it's some of the greatest music. Also reminds us about the moon landing (anniversary) next week. We also echo his sentiments and thank all the great people who worked on this wonderful space shuttle. We're ready for another day in space and ready to get to work."

Space station Flight Director Courtenay McMillan said the astronauts were about halfway done with work to unload the Raffaello multi-purpose logistics module that was carried aloft aboard Atlantis. Unloading the module is the crew's primary objective over the next several days, along with ongoing maintenance work.

"The Atlantis crew will be doing pretty much transfer all morning," said McMillan. "The Russian crew in the morning on the space station are going to be working on their treadmill. They have a gyroscope that stabilizes the treadmill and that needs to be replaced. The one that was in there failed some time ago and was removed, (it is) going to be returned on Atlantis and the new one is going in."

Two sets of round-robin media interviews are planned, the first at 6:59 a.m. and the second at 9:19 a.m. The combined 10-member shuttle-station crew plans to take their afternoon off starting at 9:44 a.m.

Video recorded by cameras on Atlantis' two solid-fuel boosters during launch last Friday will be shown on NASA television at 10 a.m., with replays at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. NASA's daily mission status briefing is scheduled for 5 p.m., followed by another booster video replay at 5:30 p.m.

Here is an updated timeline of the crew's planned activities for flight day seven (in EDT and mission elapsed time; includes revision G of the NASA television schedule; best viewed with fixed-width font):

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